Superior visibility into backup jobs: We heard you loud and clear. The Backup Exec job monitor is back. You can monitor the status of all backup jobs from a single view, giving you visibility into the status of your backup jobs. In addition, save time and simplify the creation of backup jobs by backing up and managing multiple servers with a single backup job.

Simplified upgrade/migration process: Many of you asked us to simplify the migration process to the latest version. If you are using Backup Exec 12.5, 2010 or 2012 you can upgrade and keep your jobs and settings intact, simplifying the move to Backup Exec 2014.

Granular recovery for Exchange 2013 and SharePoint 2013: Backup Exec granular recovery technology (GRT) is now available for Exchange 2013 and SharePoint 2013. From a single-pass backup, you can quickly recover granular objects such as Exchange email and SharePoint documents.

Optimized performance: In our internal testing, Backup Exec 2014 has shown up to 100%[1] faster backup and deduplication speeds compared to previous versions of the software.

What about Cloud Capabilities?

Over the past several months, many of you have been asking about cloud capabilities. I’m excited to announce that Backup Exec 2014 also supports:

Riverbed Whitewater Appliance

Quantum Q-Cloud

Please stay tuned on this front – we plan to announce support for an additional cloud platform shortly.

What Are Customers Saying?

Thank you to the more than 3,700 customers and partners who registered to participate in the Beta program this spring. Below is some of the most recent feedback we’ve received:

“I’ve used other backup solutions on a virtualized environment with varying degrees of success. But for me, the ability to back up a virtual machine image as well as the files inside it—or restore an entire virtualized application or the granular data in it, whether it’s Exchange or SharePoint or SQL—that’s what makes Backup Exec 2014 far more compelling than its competitors.” – Paul Flatt, Infrastructure and Support Manager, Mitre 10 NZ

But don’t just take their word for it, download Backup Exec 2014 today and let me know what you think. I look forward to hearing about your experience.

What’s Next?

We will continue to release service packs every 90 days, and the current target for Backup Exec 2014 Service Pack 1 is September 2014. In addition, we’ll keep you updated as we have more information to share about future product plans.

If you’d like to read more about the journey to Backup Exec 2014, check out the post from Pablo Stern, Senior vice President for Symantec Backup and Recovery, here.